Rob Newton is Associate Director at York and Scarborough Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust and Trustee at Health Services Research UK. Rob explains why, as an NHS manager, he’s joining us for the HSR UK Conference 2023.
Less than two weeks to go! I work in York and Scarborough within the medical directorate across our NHS Trust, and I’ll be coming along to this year’s HSR UK Conference for the third time. Why should I, as an NHS manager, spend my precious ‘personal development time’ with a bunch of health service researchers? Well, the very simple answer is: I’m interested in research, and if I’m involved in decision making in the NHS then it’s obvious to me that its worth engaging in stuff which helps me understand if those decisions might be sensible or not.
But that doesn’t make for much of a blog, so here are four reasons why I’m looking forward to the HSR UK Conference 2023.
1. Big picture plenaries
An occupational hazard of working in NHS management and policy is that the people who get to do the big thinking don’t do the big doing, and vice versa. I think the plenaries at the conference are the best forum in health and care for a melting pot of experts from research, practice, and policy to discuss big questions.
And the plenaries this year are knock-out. I’m most looking forward to Dr Louella Vaughan, Sir Julian Hartley, and Dr Vin Diwaker discussing “What is the future role of the hospital in the NHS?”. At York and Scarborough, this is a question we’re grappling with as we open a new £47m Acute Care Centre and explore new ways of working with primary care. What are hospitals for? Who are they for? How can the NHS provide access to acute hospital care in remote areas alongside world class specialised services in urban centres?
2. Wide ranging Research Discussions
While sat in an acute Trust, I spend most of my time thinking about acute Trust things. The seminar programme is incredibly wide ranging and gives me chance to think about other topics in health and care – social care, mental health, research methods, general practice, and plenty more. Three days to dip into a range of things outside the walls of an acute hospital – I think the current in vogue term is ‘systems thinking’.
I also enjoy the HSR UK Conference culture of peer review and debate. Other conferences I’ve been to (I won’t name them specifically, but they do tend to have very nice toilets) don’t have the same opportunity for discussion and scrutiny which you get by putting 300 researchers together. I’m looking forward to having my ideas challenged and learning what research evidence can teach us about policy and practice.
3. Friendly faces and lovely grub
An important part of any conference is the food and the company, right? There’s a conference dinner on the lawn, buffets aplenty between sessions, exercise and socialising around the grounds of the fantastic University of Birmingham campus, and plenty of opportunity for catching up and networking. As an NHS manager I’m not in the academic ‘world’, which at any other research conference might make me a bit of an outsider. But last year, I thoroughly enjoyed meeting new people from different backgrounds and careers. So if I’m eating lunch on my own, come say hi….please?
4. Well, because I have to
I, of course, should disclose my interests. I’m a Trustee of Health Services Research UK and have been a part of this year’s Conference Committee. So it would be a bit rude not to show up. See you there!
To read the full conference programme and register for your tickets, please visit our HSR UK 2023 Conference website.